The common thread I found among the religious, love, and political poetry we've been reading is the idea of exile, or "exiled, but not lost" (the last lines of EBB's "A Drama of Exile"). Certainly this is obvious in "A Drama of Exile" as Adam and Eve are exiled from idyllic beauty and peace. However, what they gain in exile is knowledge, creativity, and in this poem, love. In so many of the religious poems we've read, death is an exile, but because of the images of after-life, the exiled aren't lost--there's a way in which the dead can speak from their exile--in scary ways like "Bertha in the Lane" or ambivalent ones like the 'cloud' of witnesses in "The Runaway Slave in Pilgrim's Point", or protective ways like some of the angels in some of the other poems. However, the dead aren't the only exiles--the living are in exile, often longing for the release from life--Rossetti's "Dream Land" is one of these. Dying brings the speaker "home." In the love poems, the exiled are exiled either from or to love. EBB's being pulled by the hair in thePortuguese is not a picture of love being a "home"--it's unsettling. Certainly in "Geraldine" the speaker poet is sent into exile because of his love for the exalted Geraldine. Whether requited or not, love separates as much as draws together. In the political poetry, this idea is very easy to see--"Edith" is exiled from her culture, from church bells, and from her dead loved ones (though she's alive, she's the one in exile--isn't that what we mean when we talk about people joining others already dead?) This reflects Christian idea of being travelers and pilgrims on earth--we're the exiled, looking for a home. Certainly the Runaway slave is in exile as is the stranger in Hemans's "The Palm Tree", or the knight in "The Captive Knight". Religion, politics (and political events), and love all create boundaries, the spaces on either side of which are founts for creativity sprung from either transcendent beauty, or suffering, or the mundane. The discontent or anxiety of not being at "home" (very familiar to me these days) is productive, creative, though not always comfortable. Traversing those boundaries yields interesting perspectives. I’m reposting the above because I think there’s a relationship between exile and post/colonialism. Certainly, the colonizers are in a kind of self-imposed exile by coming into another country/continent not their own, and even more clearly the colonized become exiles in their own land, often separated from their culture, language, certainly self government, and sometimes friends, family, locale. Corinne practices a self exile. In one sense, she resists colonization by Nelvil, but because she cannot recover from his attempt at “colonizing” her, she ends up being destroyed because the one kind of exile/colonization becomes another as she becomes exiled from her art. I think one can make the case that ultimately, though she returns to Italy, she is colonized to the extent that she loses her ability to function. It is an effective colonization. What is even more distressing about her situation is that she doesn’t seem to make a lasting impact on Nelvil or England—we have some hope through Julia, all is not completely lost, the creative spirit survives, but Julia will likely not find an easy path either because she, like Corinne, will be alone. Fanny in Mansfield Park is a bit different. It is a sort of “benevolent” colonization that brings her to the home of Sir Thomas. She certainly feels the pain of exile from Portsmouth and her brother especially. However, Fanny’s story is that she and her branch of the family ultimately end up colonizing Sir Thomas’s household and with very good effects. There is no question that Fanny’s journey ends up with Susan being established in Mansfield Park. By the end of the novel, the colonization is a complete reversal of direction, and again, with positive effect. If we look at colonization in this manner, it complicates the issue. Now, no country should invade another; subjugating and looting is reprehensible. But the post colonial situation becomes complicated because the colonizing often does not remain uni-directional. The colonized have great impact on the colonizer. Certain troubling questions remain. Do the colonized have to take on the identity of the colonizer? Fanny does think of Mansfield Park as home, she’s educated there, forms her identity there, and that may be troublesome. The “Portsmouth” has been taken out of the girl, as it were. But it would be hard to argue that Fanny doesn’t gain by that re-locating of “home.” Notably, Fanny does not impact Portsmouth—she doesn’t try to change or things there. There’s no re-colonization of that space. But she successfully changes Mansfield Park, perhaps presenting another (feminine) model of colonization, one of service and improvement, not violence or patriarchy.
I’m reposting the above because I think there’s a relationship between exile and post/colonialism. Certainly, the colonizers are in a kind of self-imposed exile by coming into another country/continent not their own, and even more clearly the colonized become exiles in their own land, often separated from their culture, language, certainly self government, and sometimes friends, family, locale. Corinne practices a self exile. In one sense, she resists colonization by Nelvil, but because she cannot recover from his attempt at “colonizing” her, she ends up being destroyed because the one kind of exile/colonization becomes another as she becomes exiled from her art. I think one can make the case that ultimately, though she returns to Italy, she is colonized to the extent that she loses her ability to function. It is an effective colonization. What is even more distressing about her situation is that she doesn’t seem to make a lasting impact on Nelvil or England—we have some hope through Julia, all is not completely lost, the creative spirit survives, but Julia will likely not find an easy path either because she, like Corinne, will be alone. Fanny in Mansfield Park is a bit different. It is a sort of “benevolent” colonization that brings her to the home of Sir Thomas. She certainly feels the pain of exile from Portsmouth and her brother especially. However, Fanny’s story is that she and her branch of the family ultimately end up colonizing Sir Thomas’s household and with very good effects. There is no question that Fanny’s journey ends up with Susan being established in Mansfield Park. By the end of the novel, the colonization is a complete reversal of direction, and again, with positive effect. If we look at colonization in this manner, it complicates the issue. Now, no country should invade another; subjugating and looting is reprehensible. But the post colonial situation becomes complicated because the colonizing often does not remain uni-directional. The colonized have great impact on the colonizer. Certain troubling questions remain. Do the colonized have to take on the identity of the colonizer? Fanny does think of Mansfield Park as home, she’s educated there, forms her identity there, and that may be troublesome. The “Portsmouth” has been taken out of the girl, as it were. But it would be hard to argue that Fanny doesn’t gain by that re-locating of “home.” Notably, Fanny does not impact Portsmouth—she doesn’t try to change or things there. There’s no re-colonization of that space. But she successfully changes Mansfield Park, perhaps presenting another (feminine) model of colonization, one of service and improvement, not violence or patriarchy.